


Occhiolism

by Noivian



Series: Hiraeth - A Post-Pacifist Handplates AU [1]
Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Handplates (Undertale), Gen, No romance until part 3, OFC crushes hard, Post-Undertale Pacifist Route, Slow Burn, but it doesn't progress further, but it will in the future so i'm putting it here, insert all the trigger warnings that come with the handplates AU, like reeaaaallly slow, oh right, so slow it doesn't even really appear in this fic, tags/rating will be updated as needed
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-28
Updated: 2020-12-27
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:42:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28374849
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Noivian/pseuds/Noivian
Summary: n. The awareness of the smallness of your perspective, by which you couldn’t possibly draw any meaningful conclusions at all...
Relationships: W. D. Gaster/Original Female Character(s)
Series: Hiraeth - A Post-Pacifist Handplates AU [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2078133
Comments: 1
Kudos: 5





	Occhiolism

**Nodus Tollens**

_ n. The realization that the plot of your life doesn’t make sense to you anymore... _

* * *

_ January 1st, 202X _

_ Sometimes I wonder what my life has come to. These days I like to sit by a window and stare outside, picturing where I would be today. Where I might have ended up, had I not met... _

* * *

It was a miracle. Alphys never thought of herself to be one of faith, and calling something you did a miracle was more blasphemous than anything, so she supposed it was more of a scientific miracle. A breakthrough, if you will. 

The ringing in her ears slowly subsided, the deep  _ whumping _ sound of the machine slowing in frequency until, with a hiss of steam, the entire thing went dormant again. It had caused a power surge, taking out the lights in the entire building, and the tinged red emergency lighting had come on in its place as the building’s backup generators kicked in. Outside, she could hear footsteps, perhaps others evacuating. 

But she had to see. She had to check if her experiment was a success. 

Ever since taking up the position of Royal Scientist, the small lizard monster had been plagued with doubt. She always had a feeling that she didn’t belong in the role, that someone else was supposed to be in her position. The heavily redacted notes she found scattered around the lab didn’t exactly help her feel any more secure. But if one thing held true, it was what the notes talked about. Inter-dimensional fatigue. The Void, as she’d termed it, and the boundaries keeping the things in it out of the material plane.

Or in this case, barriers keeping things of this plane inside the Void. Barriers that could have doors attached to it.

One such door had been opened in her lab, via a new machine. Alphys had yet to name it, but the running title was Void Extraction Machine - a bit on the nose, she knew, but what did you expect from a repurposed DT Extraction Machine? Sliding off her chair onto shaky legs, Alphys rounded the control panel to see what - or who - had been pulled to the material plane. 

There, in a shaking heap on the floor and uttering some stream of groaned curses, was someone Alphys had all but forgotten about. She stumbled back, tripping on her own lab coat and taking a hard seat on the floor as shock wracked through her. How could she have forgotten? One of the most important people in her life, and she’d taken over a year to remember. 

“Dr. Gaster!” Pushing herself to her feet, Alphys closed the short distance between them rapidly, at the skeleton monster’s side in an instant. She offered her claws to help him to his feet, channeling healing magic at the same time, and was surprised to find little to no resistance. 

Gaster, on the other hand, could barely bring himself to get his bearings. The healing helped, but only to an extent. It felt like he’d fallen from the catwalk in the CORE only to land smack dab on the concrete floor in this lab. Of course, he was worse for wear than simply falling several stories to land on concrete. But somehow, the skeleton wobbled to his feet. 

The door swung open at that moment, a human head popping in to check the room. “Dr. Alphys, what are you doing?”

Alphys looked up at the sound of her name being called, her worried expression never fading. “I w-was just...”

“Just what?” the human, a man with blonde slicked back hair and beady brown eyes, interrupted. “Just blowing out the circuits again? For the third time this week? Are you trying to get fired?”

“Bartholomew-”

“Dr. Richards.”

Alphys sighed in frustration. “ _ Dr. Richards,  _ is now really the time for this?”

Bartholomew stepped fully into the room, crossing his arms. “Yes, Dr. Alphys, now is the time. Because next time, you might just blow the whole damn power grid with your insufferable machine.”

Pursing her lips, Alphys looked to the ground. “I-I’ll be more careful.” Gasping softly, she reached out to further steady Gaster when he suddenly began to lurch backwards.

Seeming satisfied, though he gave a wary look to the skeleton, Dr. Richards stepped from the room, slamming the door as he went. 

* * *

The next hour was perhaps the worst time of Alphys’ life. Er, maybe second worst time. She had to explain to the electricians why the power was out, file in her hours for sick leave, avoid a second scolding for taking sick leave in a ‘crisis’, and then drive both herself and Gaster to her house, all the while keeping the aforementioned skeleton from falling over and accidentally dusting himself from impact damage. He remained only mildly coherent through the whole ordeal, unable to sign from sheer exhaustion, managing to stay conscious enough to down some water and crackers, all the while shaking from the pain. More importantly, he just wanted to sleep. As soon as Alphys offered him a pillow and blanket, he promptly laid down for a rest on her couch.

Finally, finally, Alphys sank into the comfort of Undyne’s favorite armchair, shakily clutching her phone in her claws. Gaster was back. What had she done... what had she done...? She squeezed her eyes shut and clenched her teeth, realizing that she’d caused all this. She’d let Sans and Papyrus free... Oh God, Sans would be so pissed... She... She needed to call Asgore. Asgore would know what to do, right? ... Right?

Nervously, she unlocked the phone and flipped through her contacts to Asgore’s number, and waited with bated breath for him to pick up.

“Hello?”

Unsurprisingly, Asgore’s voice on the other end didn’t clear up Alphys’ fears. She’d have to admit to another mistake of hers. Granted, it wasn’t as bad as the amalgams, but still. It was a failure in its own right. 

“Alphys?” Asgore repeated his greeting, sounding confused on the other end.

“I-I’m here,” Alphys finally said, voice trembling. “I, uh... I may have messed up again...”

“Alphys, whatever it is, I’m sure we can work it out.”

Looking up to the sleeping form before her, she swallowed a hard lump in her throat.

“Gaster’s asleep on my couch.”

A long pause followed, and for a moment Alphys feared the call may have disconnected.

“I’ll be over shortly,” came Asgore’s curt reply, followed by the soft beeping of a call being hung up.

Exhaling slowly, Alphys stood from the armchair. If the king was coming over, it would be rude to not have at least some tea, right? Setting her phone on the side table, she wandered her way over to the kitchen, and set a kettle on the stove to boil. Meanwhile, she went into her room to at least take off her lab coat and put on something more casual, exchanging the dress shirt she wore to work under the lab coat with a slightly too large tee, the anime series pictured on the front of the shirt all but worn off. 

Standing before the mirror, she could all but feel a dream-like haze come over her. This wasn’t real, right? In a few minutes, she’ll wake up... right? The only thing that pulled her from her trance was the whistle of the kettle, so she shuffled her way back to the kitchen to pour two cups of tea, and stood there watching the steam curl up until a firm knock on the door once again pulled her back to reality. 

Setting the kettle aside, Alphys went to answer the door. Asgore, as always, took up much of the doorframe, and as Alphys stood aside to let him in, he ducked to avoid knocking his horns on the top of the frame. 

“I made some tea,” Alphys offered, closing the door, but from the look in his eyes as Asgore’s attention fell to Gaster, she could tell the king wasn’t going to be interested in it for a bit. 

For a second, she thought she saw anger, fury even, flash across the king’s face, his jaw and fists clenching as if he were to lash out, but finally he relaxed, turning away as tears briefly formed in his eyes. Alphys took that as her cue to turn away for a moment, instead focusing on retrieving the tea. When she turned back, the only evidence left of conflicting emotions was a patch of slightly damp fur around the king’s eyes. 

Asgore had chosen to sit in perhaps the most uncomfortable yet fancy looking chair that Alphys and Undyne owned, almost comically dwarfing it in the process. She offered him a mug of tea, and he gratefully accepted with a silent nod while she took a seat in the armchair. 

For a while, the two of them stared at the source of their problems, silently sipping the scalding hot liquid. Finally, Alphys steeled her nerves and spoke first. “I let them out. Sans and Papyrus, I mean.” Her gaze turned to the tea, as if it’d save her now. “It’s my fault. He fell into the CORE when Sans pushed him. I caused this.”

“You didn’t cause this,” Asgore’s deep voice rumbled, and he bowed his head solemnly. “I had wondered why Papyrus was terrified of using blue magic. Why neither of them understood me when I found them. The scar on Papyrus’ neck, the plates on their hands... I was a fool. I should have seen the signs sooner...”

Another tense silence passed. “So... what now?” Alphys asked at last.

“Humans have pardoned monsterkind for any transgressions committed in an effort to escape the Underground,” Asgore stated, “so humans won’t pursue any legal action for what he’s done... but...”

“... but we’re not human,” Alphys finished. Gaster let out a soft snore, turning to lay on his side and thus moving his glasses off-center. Without thinking, Asgore stood and removed the skeleton’s glasses, setting them gently on the coffee table before the couch. 

Asgore took a moment of contemplation and another sip of his tea. “Sans and Papyrus should decide what punishment would be most suitable. They’re the ones he hurt.”

With a solemn nod, Alphys stood as well, wordlessly taking the king’s empty mug from him and moving to place them in the kitchen sink. “Th-that would be best, I think...”

“Until they decide, we should have someone watch him. I doubt he’d try anything in this state, but...” Asgore pursed his lips, and Alphys immediately understood. Whatever trust had been between the king and the former royal scientist had now been shattered. 

Alphys nodded again, staring at the floor and hoping it would swallow her whole. A weight had formed in her gut, and she felt like she was going to puke. The coworker she’d trusted most of all, the man she had a crush on for the longest time, her role model... all that was shattered in an instant. It struck her like a truck that she could hardly recognize the skeleton on her couch. 

“I’ll... ask Undyne...” Alphys stated, voice suddenly hoarse.

“I’ll let Sans and Papyrus know about... the situation.” Asgore dipped his head. “Take care, Alphys... Stay in touch.” With that, he took his leave, softly closing the front door, as if that sound would rouse Gaster instead of all the talking they’d done while he slept.

* * *

Gaster awoke to a pounding in his head. The lights in the room were way too bright, and he squinted with a grimace, laying a bony arm across his face in an effort to block it out. The light still shone through the space between his ulna and radius. With a groan, he sat up and rubbed his face in an attempt to... wake himself up? Adjust his sight to the brightness of the room? One or the other.

“Finally! About time, sleepybones,” a cheery and frankly too loud voice sounded, and Gaster felt a weight dip the bed... cushion... near his legs.

“Too loud,” Gaster grumbled his complaint, not bothering to sign his speech. Frankly, he found he didn’t care that whoever just decided to basically yell at him - while he had a migraine, no less - couldn’t understand him. 

“Didn’t understand a word you said.” Duh, that was the point. Hey, wait a minute. Gaster was pretty sure he knew this voice... Peeking through his fingers, he made out the blurry shape of a blue monster not too far away. Undyne. Of course. The head of the Royal Guard. Gaster rubbed his face again for good measure. 

“Have you seen my glasses?” he asks, being sure to sign this time, using his real hands because he couldn’t be bothered to conjure the magic ones right now.

“Uh, yeah, they’re right here,” Undyne reaches over and picks them off the coffee table, and in Gaster’s defense, it’s a blurry black item against a blurry dark brown item, so they’d have been difficult to find regardless. Taking them from her, he’s glad to find the tape on the ends is still in place, though it’d probably need to be changed soon, and situates them on the bridge of his nose bone.

Finally with sight again, Gaster takes a moment to look around the area - it was a small apartment, with a partially separated kitchen and a door further down the wall. Around the walls was fishy decor and posters of anime framed on the walls. All in all, he didn’t recognize the place he was in.

“... Where am I?” he asked, turning back to Undyne with a confused frown and hesitant sign.

“You’re in my apartment that I share with Alphys,” Undyne stated, standing up. “Oh! And Alphys told me to tell you that you’re back in the material plane... whatever that means. Want some tea?” Without waiting for a response, she strode around the couch to the kitchen. 

Gaster blinked. Material plane? Despite his hammering headache, he probed his memories - what was the last thing he remembered? Alphys, Subject 1, the CORE... inky blackness. Pain. Excruciating pain. That entity that had attacked them in the lab... it spoke like it didn’t initially have a physical body. He hadn’t been between realities, had he? Became an interdimensional being...? 

He hadn’t realized he’d been hyperventilating until Undyne sat back down again, mug in hand, offering steaming tea. “Calm down. You’re fine now, no need to freak out.” Surprisingly, despite everyone saying being told to calm down doesn’t actually make one calm down, Gaster started to feel calmer. She was right. He was physical again, and there wasn’t any tear in the fabric of reality nearby that would let that entity through again.

Taking a moment to sip his tea, another idea suddenly came to mind, and he stared at Undyne in confusion. “Wait, since when did you and Alphys live together?”

“Since we came to the surface,” she scoffed. But upon seeing Gaster’s befuddled and disbelieving expression, her own fell to confusion. “Did... anyone tell you we’re on the surface yet?”

“You’re- you’re kidding, right? Tell me you’re joking.” he signed rapidly, peering over her shoulder to the window where the unmistakable glare of sunlight streamed through the blinds. “You’re not...” His shoulders sagged with the realization - nothing he did really mattered in the end, did it? Without him, monsters made it to the surface. Subjects One and Two... he could feel the magical tug of their hand plates, telling him where they were. So they were alive still. That entity had been right. The future truly had no interest in him. He didn’t belong here. 

So why, then, was he back here now?

“Oh, Alphys should be getting off work soon. If you’re feeling well enough, she’ll probably want to have a chat with you. Said something yesterday about you being here is the breakthrough of the decade.” Undyne beamed proudly.

Gaster smiled softly, looking down to his cup of tea. “She always did sell herself short,” he signed. “It would be more like the breakthrough of the century. If she was able to move not just matter, but an entire body, SOUL, and consciousness across the border between this plane of existence and the next without repercussions, then that opens up so many possibilities. If we can move people, then we can move objects, perhaps a shuttle of some kind, we could map it out, use it to more easily traverse this universe. The possibilities are endless.” With a slight shake of his head, he continued signing, “She deserves the title of Royal Scientist much more than I do.”

Undyne couldn’t help but smile softly, despite the heavy sadness that seemed to weigh on his demeanor. “Yeah, she’s something. I couldn’t be more proud.” 

Her words pierced him like daggers, and for a second time the realization sunk in that no one would be proud of him. He’d not done anything that could have made a difference. 

* * *

By the time Alphys was home, Gaster’s headache had subsided. Though there hadn’t been much need for him to get up aside from other beverages, he was certain he’d have no problem walking. Signing with magical hands wasn’t a problem, and perhaps he’d be able to defend himself a little without getting winded. Not that he’d need to, as Undyne explained, humans were supposedly peaceful now. At least, for the last year monsters had been on the surface, not a single crime was made against monsters. Sure, there was controversy regarding the monsters’ return, but none of it seemed to reach the town most monsters resided in. 

Alphys’ entrance would have almost gone entirely missed, the small lizard scientist busy frowning at her phone as she silently closed the door behind her. “Welcome home!” Undyne called, standing to greet her, but paused midway to a hug when she saw Alphys’ expression. “... Is it Asgore?” 

Pursing her lips, the smaller monster looked to her phone and nodded slightly. 

“Did they decide?”

Another nod. 

Undyne’s disposition immediately deflated. “How bad is it?”

Gaster frowned, looking between the two of them. “What’s bad? What’s happened?” he signed, floating his magical hands over to be included in the conversation. After a moment to set his tea down on the coffee table, he stood to join where they were standing by the door.

When Alphys shuffled her feet, hesitant to talk, Undyne spoke up. “We know what you did to Sans and Papyrus. And... we’ve been discussing a fitting punishment.”

Whatever fragment of happiness that was left in his SOUL left at that moment. Not only had his work accomplished nothing, he was now facing the repercussions, which only served to rub salt in the wound. He’d brought undue stress and pain upon himself and those around him, and for what? A feeling of accomplishment?

Despite all these swirling emotions, he managed to keep a straight face, having shut down to block out any emotional response, just as he had when he had to punish the subjects... “What was the decision?” he signed flatly.

“W-we left that up to Sans and Papyrus to decide, since they had been most hurt. They, uh...” looking down to her phone again, Alphys continued carefully, “Papyrus had elected to not give a punishment.” Typical of 2-P... Papyrus now, he supposed. The taller brother always was too kind for his own good. “Sans, though...” she shuffled nervously. “I-it’s kind of ironic, and poetic in a way... He, uh, decided that because he’d had to spend a large amount of time with someone he didn’t like, uh, probably meaning you, that, uh, y-you’d have to suffer the same fate...?”

Honestly, Gaster was a bit surprised, and that shock managed to slip through his facade of indifference in the form of raised brows. “Really? That’s it?” he signed, unwilling to believe that to be the truth.

Alphys checked the phone again, and nodded hesitantly. “We already decided who, as well...”

“Well, then, who is it?”

She looked to Undyne, who tilted her head, equally curious. “There’s an, uh, intern c-coming in tomorrow to work over the summer. She’s a p-postgraduate student from the local university. She’ll be your lab assistant.”

Gaster tilted his head now too, uncertain why this was a punishment Sans deemed fitting. “Wait, lab assistant?”

“That’s the o-other thing,” Alphys continued. “I-if we didn’t remember you until you returned to this plane of existence, th-then... there’s potentially more monsters that we could save from the void as well. But... well, bringing you back almost caused a major power outage. So, I was thinking...”

Already, the dots were starting to connect. “I’m assuming the CORE was your solution, correct?” Gaster asked, lowering one brow. “If we’re on the surface, how exactly do you plan to transport all that power?”

“Th-that’s where the humans come in!” Alphys raised a digit, as if making an important point. “They have massive superconductive cables, and the workforce to build the infrastructure to contain it all. That, and...” she sheepishly looked away, shuffling lightly, “monsters didn’t stray that far from the Underground. Our town is in Mt. Ebott’s foothills, the lab only a couple miles from the entrance...”

He sighed bitterly through his teeth. Of course that was Alphys’ plan. She trusted the humans too much... put too much faith in them. He had a sinking feeling, though, that this wasn’t his choice to make. Surely Asgore wouldn’t put Gaster back as the Royal Scientist after what he’d done. “Fine. What do you need from me?”

“I’d need your help with the CORE,” Alphys stated, seemingly more elated that he’d decided to go along with the plan. “No one knows it better than you, so figuring out the mechanical logistics... that would be your job. Once that’s all in place, we can begin construction.”

“Of course. When does this all start?”

“Um... tomorrow, if you feel up to it?” Alphys offered with a small shrug. Gaster crossed his arms in response to her uncertainty to make plans. He had his doubts and reservations about this plan of hers, but he seemed to have passed the point where choices were his to make anymore. Now seemed to be a time when repentance was the only way forwards.

Never did Gaster bother to ask himself if he actually did regret his decision all those years ago.

**Author's Note:**

> Alright here we go. Jump on the hype train and strap in tight, we're in for a wild ride kiddos. We've got three parts, with three chapters each. No hand rails, no emergency breaks, and no complementary snacks.
> 
> I began plotting this story about two years ago, and at the time I figured I'd sketch out a basic plot layout and maybe the idea will go away. Plot twist: it didn't. So here I am two years later, having simmered and simmered on ideas and scenes, until finally it all just kind of boiled over onto a Google doc. I cranked out this chapter in just under twelve hours of straight work. And this is supposed to be a short chapter. 
> 
> Suffice to say, I have no clue when next chapter will be coming out, and if my other series fic is anything to go off of, I might be stuck writing this behemoth of a plot for maybe four years. We'll see. I estimate each chapter to be between 5-10k words, so let's keep track of how many times I hit that mark. For fun, yeah? This beast of a chapter clocks in at just under 4k words, so not quite there yet.
> 
> For those of you interested, I know Hiraeth is a Google-able word, but the names of the parts and chapters might not come so readily. They're from the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows. Kind of fitting for the subject matter, I think.


End file.
